Comment Policy
Offensive, harrassing or baiting comments will not be tolerated and will be deleted at my discretion.
Comment spam will be deleted.
Please leave a name and either a valid web-site or e-mail address with comments. Comments left without either a valid web-site or e-mail address may be deleted. Atom Feed LiveJournal SyndicationLOLcats feed
Monday, June 27, 2005
Marvel's September Solicitations
I'm in a rush this morning, so all I really have time to do is look at something short. And I'm short on interest in Marvel's September releases. (Yeah, that was terrible, I know...)
Maximum Fantastic Four? So, you take a reprint of the first issue of a comic that was very much of it's era, and slap a buzzword from five years ago onto it to make it sound hip and contemporary? Y'know, it worked, sort of, for the ultimate line, but I don't think it's going to work for a $50 hard-cover.
I like how Wolverine #33 is listed in the solicitations before Wolverine #32, and in a separate section. I'm sure that won't cause any problems for retailers come time to order the books. (Publishers: list your releases by alphabetical order or by imprint...don't just scatter them around by some method that only makes sense to you.)
Ultimate Secret #3 finally gets a solicitation, with a new artist, Tom Raney. Long delays and artist changes do have a tendency to piss off readers, so I can only imagination that the combination of both will alienate a fair number of people.
Speaking of long delays, Ultimate Iron Man #4 is scheduled to ship in September. Anyone want to take bets on when it will actually ship?
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say something that will make most people think I've gone insane: Spider-Girl is the most enjoyable Marvel comic I've read in months. It's very nice sometimes to read a comic that isn't taking itself seriously and is just trying to be fun and entertaining. Covers like this certainly drive that point home.
Y'know, more power to Garth Ennis and all that. I understand that the Marvel work subsidizes stuff like 303, but Ghost Rider is one of those comic-book concepts that just may be past its sell-by date. The only people we ever get asking for it anymore are little kids, and something tells me I'm not really going to be able to sell this series to them anyway.
New Avengers #11 features the "debut [of] the mysterious New Avenger everyone has been talking about all year!!" I'm not quite sure "who the hell is that guy and why does he merit a variant cover all his own?" is quite the kind of buzz Marvel was hoping for on this Ronin character. I also like how they especially point out that it's not just Daredevil in a new costume. I think the decision may have gone something like this: "The fans will never guess that Ronin is actually Daredevil in a new costume?" "Uhm, actually, on-line fan speculation is that it is Daredevil in a new costume." "Well, crap. Tell Bendis that he better make it someone else. Like...Matt Murphy, a blind...accountant. That should work. No one ever realized that Jessica Jones, an ex-super-hero detective, was just a thinly rewritten Spider-Woman did they?"
Hey look, a book I might actually be able to sell: Franklin Richards: Son of a Genius. Probably not to kids, no, but I might be able to sell it to adults looking for a book for kids.
Ah, a new darkly grim version of Drax the Destroyer! That's exactly what the comics industry needs.
Thor: Blood Oath is set at some indeterminate point in Marvel's past. Because Marvel just isn't quite willing yet to either go ahead with a New Thor comic or to let the property die. I'd be just as happy with letting the book die. It's, again, a concept that is probably past its sell-by date, and the times that the book has been good are few and far between. It ended on a nice note, and that should be it. Of course, Marvel won't do that, because someone, somewhere, may want to make a movie based on Thor. I think I like Mike's idea for Thor the best. Have Neil Gaiman take one for the team. Nobody could do anything with Dr. Strange for a long-time because J. Michael Straczynski had that brilliant idea of re-imagining him for a new millennium and didn't want anyone else's use of the character to interfere with that. Neil Gaiman needs to do the same thing, tell Marvel that he doesn't want anyone else to do anything with Thor until he has time to re-write the character. Sure, that would more or less obligate him to write Thor at some point, but what's Marvel going to do, tell Neil Freaking Gaiman "no?"
The solicitation for Young Avengers #8 reads: "The secrets are OUT when Captain America and Jessica Jones confront the Young Avengers' parents about their children's double lives." See, I like how they made sure to emphasize the word "out," almost as if they wanted to tease readers with the potential of a deviate romantic relationship between two of the characters that they are never going to develop or act on in any way, shape or form because they know that Marvel readers think that gay people are icky. But boy oh boy, does Marvel love the free publicity that people arguing about it gives them.
Atom Feed
